Filmbrain's Screen Capture Quiz: Round 10, Week 5

No, the pint-sized police officer from last week's quiz was most certainly not Tim Kazurinsky from Police Academy 3: Back in Training. It was in fact Mickey Gubitosi, better known as Robert Blake, from the great (and neglected) American masterpiece, Electra Glide in Blue. Booed at the 1973 Cannes Film Festival (with cries of "fascist"), director James William Guercio's only feature is not without its controversy, but is one of the most gorgeous Panavision films of the decade, with a visual style that recalls John Ford. If you haven't seen this film yet, you simply must. The DVD looks great, and there's a fantastic audio commentary by the director. I've been meaning to write about this one for ages -- perhaps I'll do so in the upcoming weeks, for I'd love to hear some other thoughts on the film. As I write this, the election results are just beginning to trickle in, and it's far too soon to tell if the mighty warlord George Walter Bush will be reduced to un canard boiteux. In the spirit of the day, this week's screen cap comes from a political film set in a time when....well, you know. Name the film. Submit your answers to this address. Good luck!

Comments

[driftwood]

I’ve always liked “Electra Glide in Blue”, but it seems like nobody I know has seen it. I hope you do write it up. I might even have to watch it again since it has been ages.

[mike]

For all of you wanting to see it again or Glide-curious who have never seen it, Electra Glide in Blue will be on Turner Classic movies in Glorious Letterbox on 11/11 at 2 am. Rock on.

Don't blink or you'll miss the uncredited cameo of Nick Nolte as a hippie

[dubarry]

cinematic soul-mate, so. 3 perfectly disjointed thoughts.

isn't it hard to remember how good some actors were before they turned into total whack jobs?

today's capture was the perfect visual embodiment of the task at hand.

you know who i have been thinking about? ulu grossbard. particularly: straight time

[Squish]

Final reminder of the Alfred hitchcock Blog-A-Thon on November 15th over @ www.pasquish.blogspot.com!

[Noel Vera]

It's gorgeous. Among other shots, the final one, a tumble and a long, haunting withdrawal down the blacktop. Like a farewell to the character and a hello to the rest of the world at the same time.

[colinr0380]

I was just reading David Thomsons entry on Robert Blake in his Biographical Dictionary of Film and he ends his entry with this:

"And then in 2001, bizarre melodrama: a wife - yet hardly a wife? - a restaurant, a car, shots in the night. And they say that David Lynch is fanciful."

What exactly happened in the real life situation that Thomson refers to?

[Filmbrain]

Blake and his wife were leaving a restaurant in LA. She got in the car, he went back to the restaurant (or so he claims) to retrieve his gun, which he left there. When he got back to the car, she was dead.

He was acquitted of the crime, but was sued in a civil trial and found liable for her death.

Marlon Brando's son was somehow involved, but I don't remember the details.

[mike]

Bonnie Lee Bakely was dating Blake and Christian brando at the same time. She became pregnant and told both Blake and Brando that they were the father.

[mike]

and of course I forgot to tape Electra Glide in Blue. D'oh.